


Old Habits

by HolmesianDeduction



Series: The Streets Were Full of Strangers - A Prohibition Era AU [3]
Category: Les Misérables (2012), Les Misérables - All Media Types, Les Misérables - Schönberg/Boublil, Les Misérables - Victor Hugo
Genre: Alternate Universe - 1920s, Azelma Jondrette, Character Study, Developing Relationship, Genderfluid Character, Other, Prohibition Era AU, The Streets Were Full of Strangers
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2013-08-04
Updated: 2013-08-04
Packaged: 2017-12-22 09:15:19
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 429
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/911494
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/HolmesianDeduction/pseuds/HolmesianDeduction
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>For Javert, admitting that something makes you happy has always been like a jinx, and it is in this regard only that he is superstitious.</p>
<p>A sort of companion piece to <a href="http://sevenpercentsolutions.tumblr.com/post/55727189569/minding-cues">"Minding Cues"</a>.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Old Habits

             “Are you happy?”

             The words brush over the back of his ear as the lips they slipped from graze his skin.

             “What?”

             Even to his own ears, his voice is slightly fuzzy and drowsy; he sounds “fucked out,” as the body laying against him in the dark would have put it.

             “Does this make you happy?”

              _And the underlying follow-up: “Do I make you happy?”_

             He doesn’t answer, instead pursing his lips and closing his eyes; then, when they persist, rolling over onto his other side and silencing their questions with a kiss that was meant to be a simple “oh be quiet” but instead turned hungry and needy and full of teeth, and hands in their hair, and slender fingertips pressed into his hip.

             But when they finally pull away, their chests rising and falling just slightly out of sync with one another, they ask again, the words slipping past their lips in between shallow breaths and attempts at stifling a smile.

             “Are you happy?”

             He doesn’t answer, and he suddenly has his breath back as his smile disappears from his lips and he rolls onto his back to stare at the ceiling. He can feel their eyes on him and worse, he can feel the question lurking just behind their lips, so he doesn’t look – as if not looking will keep it from emerging.

             Finally, the question comes anyway.

             “Let’s try this one then. Are you _unhappy_?”

             This question, he answers, the single syllable barely audible even in the stillness of the room.

             “No.”

             Delicate, barely calloused fingertips slide over his stomach as their chin rests on his shoulder, and he can feel their eyes on him again, can almost hear the gears turning in their head.

             “You’re not unhappy.”

             “No.”

             “But you’re not _happy_ either.”

             He doesn’t answer.

             No, he admits to himself, he _can’t_ answer.

             To admit that something makes him happy – not just happy, but desperately, almost dizzyingly happy – even for a moment, has always been to have it taken away from him. Comfort had never been a thing to be kept, but was instead a fleeting sensation – a reward for an action that lasted until he admitted that it made him happy, but then vanished.

             Beside him, the question brushes against his neck and then retreats to watch him with pursed lips and a perplexed frown.

             He still doesn’t answer, but instead rolls back onto his side and gratefully accepts their face burrowing into the crook of his neck and the smell of their shampoo when he presses his face into their hair.


End file.
